A little while back we brought you a video featuring footage of artist Michel de Broin's "Shared Propulsion Car" as he and some friends rolled it out of a garage, climbed in and began pedaling (yes, I said pedaling) their way a short distance down the street. The ride was short because, before they were too tired to pedal the hollowed-out shell of the 1986 Buick Regal further, they were pulled over by Toronto's finest in a traditionally-powered squad car. Apparently the officers were under the impression that an unsafe vehicle was being operated and had decided to take decisive action. A tow truck was called and a court summons to face aforementioned charges issued to Trevor Baldwin, who was behind the wheel at the time of interdiction.

The court finally heard the case and, according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) News website, "As the Crown prosecutor tried to make his case Thursday, the court erupted in laughter, and the charges were thrown out." After the hearing, Baldwin was asked about his plans and is quoted as saying, "I'm thinking it's a really nice day, so we might go for a drive." A nice way to celebrate his legal victory indeed. To check out the original footage of the incident, hit the jump.

Have you heard about Aeromovel, a train that is driven by compressed air? You can see the train (which has no on-board motor) as it uses a sail-like propulsion device on what looks like traditional train tracks in the video above. It's currently in use in Brazil and Indonesia. Below the fold is a video of a vehicle that can only carry one person but has access to a street car's network of rails. Usually, street cars are designed to carry lots of people. Oh, another strange thing about the personal street car concept vehicle is it looks like a flying carpet.

Related:

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• Video: Car-free city coming 2009
• Video of "naked streets" and how banning stop lights will save gas
• Cool videos: street lamp electric bubble car, Disney's 1958 hovering solar car

[Source: YouTube]

The SF Gate has an unusual article about artist Andrew Junge's latest work: a Hummer sculpted out of Styrofoam. Andrew scavenged the Styrofoam from the trash while at SF Recycling & Disposal's Artist In Residence Program. The Hummer, made from measurements of a bio-diesel Hummer, is 17 feet long, 6 feet high, and over 8 feet wide. The Styrofoam Hummer was recently shown at the Tampa Museum of Art. GM, give Andrew a call and buy this piece! It would be a hit at car shows and the shipping would be next to nothing because it's so light. Check out the gallery below with close ups of the Hummer.

Related:

• Army to start evaluating balsa wood and foam Humvee
• LA Auto Show: A Hummer built for Oprah
• What do Hummer owners think of Scooterists?

[Source: SFGate via Neatorama]

In general humans tend to think at a very local scale. They can visualize the things that directly impact their lives, like how much they spend on groceries or rent. But as numbers grow beyond that local human scale they become increasingly abstract and hard to get your head around. How big is 93,000,000 (roughly the number of miles to the Sun) or $8,822,366,610,275 (the current amount of the US National debt)? In isolation they don't mean much.

Visual representations can more readily give a sense of scale to huge numbers. Artist Chris Jordan has created a series of images that provide some sense of visual scale to the numbers that represent our consumption patterns. The image of Mt. Denali is comprised of 24,000 GMC Denali logos, equivalent to six weeks of sales of the SUV in 2004. There are more striking images at Chris' website.

[source: Chris Jordan via Gizmodo]